The right tools are an integral part of getting any job done. In the world of digital content tools are plentiful, so finding the right one for you can be tricky. That's why we ask the experts what tools they use to get their jobs done. In this month's installment, we talk to Ashley Taylor Anderson, Director of Content, Ceros.

SPACE/XML Standard Released

IDEAlliance (International Digital Enterprise Alliance) and its SPACE/XML Working Group have released the SPACE/XML standard--an XML schema-based standard for the print media publishing information supply chain. SPACE/XML is one of the first industry applications of the Worldwide Web Consortium (W3C) compliant schema. SPACE/XML (Specifications for Publisher & Agency Communications Exchange: IDEAlliance Standard 150-2002) presents a standard electronic format for sending and acknowledging advertising space reservations, insertion orders, and extensible digital file of creative material between advertising agencies, prepress or premedia services, printers, and publishers. This freely available standard is designed to enable a process of well-defined information exchange and create a uniform way for all parties to conduct business. The SPACE/XML standard is endorsed by the Newspaper Association of America (NAA), Digital Distribution of Advertising for Publications (DDAP) Association, and the Production Committee of the Magazine Publishers of America (MPA). The working group is chaired by Craig Shrader and involved more than 40 representatives across 30 companies in the agency, premedia, printer, publisher value chain. The committee's release of SPACE/XML is the next generation of the Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) standard for advertising, published in 1991, and the SPACE/X12 version, published in 2000. The SPACE/XML standard is available FREE at the IDEAlliance Web site.